Whales are critical organisms in the Earth’s ocean ecosystems. Increased shipping, the construction of off-shore wind farms and rising sea temperatures have decimated their populations. Because whales have long lifespans and migrate over large areas, we do not have an ecological baseline to evaluate their population dynamics and shrinking of habitats. Such information is, however, available in the historical (the last few centuries old) and fossil whale remains in the North Sea. Geoscientific expertise can aid conservation by unlocking environmental and ecological records from these remains. In this project we will focus on whale teeth, as teeth are often the only part of the organism which becomes preserved. Owing to its chemical stability, tooth enamel preserves environmental information of the organism’s diet, migrations and temperature. Your tasks will be to sample whale teeth from fossil collections in museums and from recently stranded and deceased whales at the Faculty of Veterinary Medicine. The animals keep their teeth throughout their lives. We will target sperm whales and harbor porpoises, as both species are of acute interest in terms of population decline, but they represent different ecologies. You will carry out isotopic, elemental and mineralogical analyses, as well as experimental diagenesis, on modern teeth. In parallel to laboratory work, you will compile information on the distribution and ecology of sperm whales and harbor porpoises in the North Sea to evaluate how well the geochemical proxies reflect this knowledge.
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